Card storage and selection device



1966 R. B. CLOVER, JR, ETAL 3,283,761

CARD STORAGE AND SELECTION DEVICE Filed NOV. 29, 1963 2 Sheets-Sheet l RICHMOND B. CLOVER, 'JR. ERNEST P. KOLLAR FIG. 1 B) AGE/VT 1966 R. B. CLOVER, JR, ETAL 3,283,761

CARD STORAGE AND SELECTION DEVICE 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed Nov. 29, 1963 United States Patent 3,283,761 CARD STORAGE AND SELECTION DEVICE Richmond B. Clover, Jr., and Ernest P. Kollar, Vestal,

N.Y., assignors to international Business Machines Corporation, New York, N.Y., a corporation of New York Filed Nov. 29, 1963, Ser. No. 326,746 3 (Ilairns. (Cl. tin-416.1)

This invention relates to a card storage and selection device of the type which is particularly adapted for selectively sorting cards of the type widely known commercially as Keyso-rt cards.

Cards of the type referred to are provided along one or more edges with one or more rows of perforations which are grouped and identified by suitable indicia to represent desired classifications.

In practice, a plurality of these perforations are notched or slotted out to the edge of the card, forming a pattern of notches or slots pertaining to a single classification. The cards when thus notched or slotted may be selectively sorted by passing one or more sorting rods through the selected perforations of a group of cards, which perfortions represent the desired classification. By then elevating the sorting rod or rods, the cards having notches or slots coinciding with the perforations penetrated by the rod or rods will disengage from the rods, while the remainder of the cards will remain suspended from the rod or rods. Thus, the cards of one or more selected classifications are sorted from a stack of cards.

Sorting boxes or selection devices for carrying out the above described type of sorting operation have in the past required that the sorted cards be manually removed by hand from the rods or sorting needles to enable the cards to be further classified. After further classification, the cards had to again be handled by hand in order to be re placed back into storage or file. Such a procedure tends to be cumbersome, time consuming and harmful to the cards from the standpoint of wear and legibility. Also, known sorting devices of this type do not provide adequate means to facilitate quick and easy direct readout scanning of the sorted cards which may be translucent. The use of translucent cards which lend themselves to optical coincidence scanning for direct readout has proven very desirable in diagnostic computer type applications and there is a need for a sorting or selector box which is particularly adapted to supply the cards for diagnostic computer systerns.

In providing an improved card selector device, the present invention makes use of a card box comprising two telescoping sections. When assembled, the box is adapted to hold a stack of record cards for both storage and selection purposes. One of the sections is provided with a row of sorting needles or rods along with suitable means for operating selected needles to select certain cards of the stack. After the selected needles have been operated, the telescoped sections are separated and an important feature of the present invention resides in the provision of suitable spring members within each section so that as the sections are separated the selected cards are compressed in one directed against the side of one section while the remainder of the stack is compressed in an opposite direction against the side of the other section. As a result of this action, the section holding the selected cards may be simply and quickly inserted into a diagnostic computer system for optical coincidence scanning and direct readout of classified information. When it is desired to return the selected cards back to storage, the two sections are simply put back together whereupon the cards that had been selected and removed will be automatically inserted back into the stack The device may be simply and quickly operated and requires no hand contact with the cards themselves. Additionally, the selected cards when removed are automatically positioned and held as a compressed stack ready for direct readout.

"ice

in selected document-s may be automatically retrieved in compressed stack form.

A still further object of the present invention is to provide an improved document storage and selection device wherein selected documents may be automatically retrieved from a deck of stored documents and the retrieved documents may be automatically re-inserted back into the v deck.

The foregoing and other objects, features and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following more partciular description of a preferred embodiment of the invention, as illustrated in the accompanying drawings.

In the drawings:

FIGURE 1 is an exploded perspective view showing the manner of assembling a document storage and selection device embodying the principles of the present invention.

FIGURE 2 is a perspective view showing the device of FIGURE 1 assembled with a card deck and the card selected mechanism.

FIGURE 3 is an end elevation view of the device of FIGURE 2 with some of the pins or rods of selection mechanism actuated to selected certain cards in the stored card deck.

FIGURE 4 is an end elevation view showing the storage and selection device separated with selected cards moved to a retrieved position and retained in the form of a compressed stack.

Referring more particularly to FIG. 1 of the drawings, the preferred form of document storage and selection device comprises a U-shaped bottom frame unit It) and an inverted U-shaped upper frame unit 11. The frame units are designed to fit together in telescoping fashion and for this purpose the bottom frame 10 is provided at each corner with a vertically extending guide rod 12. The four guide rods 12 are adapted to slide into and support four hollow sleeve member 13 attached at the corners of the upper frame unit 11 so that the upper frame unit may be positioned in telescoping fashion on the lower frame unit to providea separable four-sided enclosure or box structure, as shown in FIG. 2.

The bottom section 14 and the front and back sections 15 and 16 making up the lower frame unit are solid and the unit is adapted to hold a deck of cards 17 in vertical position for both storage and sorting purposes. If desired, the lower frame may be provided with end sections to seal the stored deck from dirt and the like. As was previously set forth, the cards 17 are preferably Keysort cards which are provided with sorting holes 18 distributed along one edge of the card. Punching 19 are notched out to the edge in patterns to represent a desired classification. The cards 17 are also'preferably of a translucent material to facilitate optical coincidence scanning of the data perforations 20 although it will be understood that the present device may be used to store and sort opaque documents as Well.

The top frame unit 11 is made up of a solid top section 21 and front and back sections 22 and 23. The front and back sections are provided with similar large central windows or cut-out portions 24 and 25, which are in alignment with each other. Distributed along the top edge of the front section 22 are a plurality of thru-holes 26 which sildeably support the sorting needles or rods 27 and extending out from the front of section 22 are three rods 28 which serve to slidably support the mechanism for selecting the sorting needles 27.

To facilitate the separation of selected cards in compressed stack form from the remainder of the deck, as will be described, the lower frame unit is provided with a pair of spring members 29 and the upper frame unit is provided with a pair of similar spring members 30. The spring members 29 are attached to the back section 16 near its upper corners and extend downwardly and toward the front section 15. The spring members 30 are attached to the front section 22 near its lower corners and extend upwardly and toward the back section 23.

Referring now to FIGS. 2 and 3, the device is shown assembled in telescoping fashion with the deck of cards 17 stored therein in a vertical position preparatory to a selection operation. The sleeves are positioned on the rods 12 such that the upper frame unit fits down over and overlaps the lower frame unit in the front and the thru-holes 26 along the top edge of the front section 22 of the upper frame unit will be in horizontal and vertical alignment with a horizontal cut-out portion 31 (FIG. 1) along the top edge of the front section 15 of the lower frame unit to allow for passage of the sorting needles through the sorting holes 18 of the cards. With the card deck in the position shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, the sorting holes 18 in the cards will be horizontal and vertical alignment with the cut-put portion 31, the thru-holes 26 and the sorting needles 27 In this position, as shown in FIG. 3, the deck of cards 17 stands free with the spring members 29 flexed against the back section 23 of the upper frame unit and the spring members 341? flexed against the front section 15 of the lower frame unit. The space in the lower frame unit for the card deck is larger than is needed to allow the deck to be loosely packed and to be easily separated into two decks after selection.

Referring particularly to FIG. 2, the selection mechanism for operating the sorting needles 27 comprises a restoring bar 32 and an actuator bar 33. The restoring bar 32 is sildeably mounted on the rods 28 and normally is positioned against the front section 22 of the upper frame unit. A plurality of sorting needle receiving holes 34 are provided along the restoring bar which are in alignment with the thru-holes 26 and the sorting needles 27 are mounted for sliding movement in the holes 26 and 34. A relatively thick flange section 35 is provided behind the front section 22 through which the thru-holes 26 extend, the flange section providing greater supporting surface for the needles.

For selection purposes, the holes 34 in the restoring bar are coded and, as shown in FIG. 2, they may, for example, be codeed in symmetrical fashion. That is, the holes in the left-half of th bar are coded A, B, C through N, reading from left to right, and the holes in the righthalf of the bar are coded N through A, reading from left to right. For each card selected, two needles are pushed through the box and card deck, i.e., needles A and A for card A, D and D for card D, etc. Using this symmetrical arrangement of sorting needles, only one manual selection is needed to select both primed and unprimed needles. This is accomplished by the manual needle selector and actuator 33.

As shown, the selector bar 33 is half the length of the coded restoring bar and is provided at one end with a hole 36 for mounting onto the center rod 28. The opposite end of the bar is provided with two oppositely disposed U-shaped cut-outs 37 and 38 for positioning that end of the bar on either the left-hand rod 28 or the right-hand rod 28. A selector tab 39 is slideably mounted for horizontal movement along the bar to select a sorting needle.

To select card C, for example, the selector bar is first positioned at the ends of the center and left-hand rods 28, which rods extend out far enough so that the selector bar will clear the end of the sorting needles when they are in their fully retracted position. Then, the selector tab 39 is moved to a position in alignment with the bentover end portion 40 of sorting needle C, each of the sorting needles being provided with such a bent-over portion suitable for coaction with the restoring and selector bars. When the bar 33 is pushed in, tab 35 will push the selected C needle through the card deck to engage one of the sorting holes 18 in the card C. The unselected needles will remain unactuated passing through a slot 41 in the selector bar. The selector bar 33 is then retracted, rotated degrees about the center rod 23, as illustrated by the dotted position in FIG. 2, and pushed in again to enable the tab 39 to push in the C needle to engage the other sorting hole 18 and complete the selection of the C card.

When all of the desired cards have been selected and engaged by their corresponding needles, the upper frame unit 11 is lifted off of the lower frame unit 10 and separated therefrom, as shown in FIG. 4. During this separation, the spring members 30 will engage the selected cards which are hanging from their corresponding needles and push them back against the rear section 23 of the upper frame unit. The force of the spring members 30 is sufficient so that the selected cards will be retained in this position as a compressed deck 42. The unselected cards in the remainder of deck 17 will be engaged by the spring members 29 an pushed forward against the front section 15 of the lower frame unit 10 and retained in this position as a compressed deck.

With the selected and unselected card decks thus separated, the upper frame unit 11 may be simply inserted into a suitable system to position the selected compressed deck for optical coincidence scanning of the translucent cards through the cut-out windows 24 and 25 of the unit. A typical optical system may include a lamp used in connection with a reflecting mirror for projecting light through condensing lenses, through the card deck, and thence through an object lens, whence the image may be reflected from a mirror onto a screen where it may be observed either by eye or by means such as a photocell and meter. Such a system is shown and described in common assignees co-pending application Serial No. 246,525, filed December 21, 1962.

To return the selected deck back to storage the frame units are assembled back together to the position shown in FIGS. 2 and 3 and the selected deck will be positioned back into the lower frame unit and behind the unselected deck. The spring members 29 and 30 will be disengaged from the cards by the frame sections 23 and 15, respective-ly. The restoring bar 32 is retracted to retract the selected needles 27 back to their normal posit-ion and the device is ready for another selection operation.

If desired, various modifications may be made to the present device. For example, spring loaded rollers or disks may be used in place of the spring members 29 and 3d. Also, the sorting needles or bails which select the cards can be arranged such that the distance between the two needles holding a card is the same for every card in the card deck. The needles would be arranged A, B, C N and A, B, C N instead of as is shown in FIG. 2. This would minimize the maximum angle through which a selected card might deviate from the other selected cards, which is important if the selected cards are to be superimposed to perform a desired operation. Through electronic and/or mechanical means, it is possible to select both the unprimed and primed needles for a given card in one exterior selection using a double length selector bar 33 or by employing, for example, punching key A on a keyboard to insert both needle A and needle A into the card deck to select card A. If plastic translucent cards are used for coincidence scanning, the arrangement shown in FIG. 2 operates very satisfactorily since the superior hardness, strength and rigidity of the plastic card compared to a paper card allows a reduction in tolerance on card dimensions, holes in the cards, etc.

A selector system can also be employed at the bottom Ra edge of the card deck such that unselected cards would be held in place while .the selected cards of the subdeck are drawn away from the parent deck.

The present device can be used for any reasonable size document and hence has several other potential applications other than use with the transiucent card deck of a diagnostic computer. For instance, this device \could be applied to a relatively small peek-a-boo system with readout done directly with selected cards in the upper frame unit. Several boxes of cards could be categorized and used for a single retrieval.

While the invention has been particularly shown and described with reference to a preferred embodiment thereof, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes in form and details may be made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.

What is claimed is:

11. A card storage and selection device comprising:

a pair of frame units assembled together in vertical telescoping fashion and adapted to be vertically separated;

a deck of cards supported in an upright position within said units, said cards having coded edge perforations for classification;

a row of sorting needles horizontally disposed on one of said units and adapted to be moved horizontally through said assembled units and into engagement with the edge perforations of the cards in said card deck;

selector means for moving selected ones of said sorting needles into engagement with the edge perforations of selected cards in said card deck, said sorting needles being effective to lift and separate the selected card from said card deck upon vertical separation of said units;

compressing means in said one unit having the sorting needles and means on said other unit for holding said compressing means disengaged from said card deck when said units are assembled, said compressing means being effective upon vertical separation of the units to move the selected cards horizontally in one direction to compress same against the frame of that unit; and

compressing means in said other unit and means on said one unit for holding said last named compressing means disengaged from said card deck when said are assembled, said last named compressing means being effective upon vertical separation of the units to move the unselected cards horizontally in a direction opposite to the direction of horizontal movement of said selected cards to compress the unselected cards against the frame of said other unit.

2. A card storage and selection device comprising:

an upper frame unit and lower frame unit assembled together in telescoping relationship and adapted to be vertically separated;

a deck of cards supported in an upright position within said units, said cards having coded edge perforations for classification;

a row of sorting needles horizontally disposed on said upper unit and adapted to be moved horizontally through said assembled units and into engagement with the edge perforations of the cards in said card deck;

selector means for moving selected ones of said sorting needles into engagement with the edge perforations of selected cards in said card deck, said sorting needles being effective to lift and separate the selected cards from said card deck upon vertical separation of said units;

a first pair of spring members fastened inside said upper frame unit and means on said lower frame unit for normally holding said first members disengaged from said card deck, said first pair of spring members being freed upon vertical separation of said units to move the selected cards horizontally in one direction to compress same against the frame of said upper frame unit; and

a second pair of spring members fastened inside said |lower frame unit and means on said upper frame unit for normally holding said second members disengaged from said card deck, said second pair of spring members being freed upon vertical separation of said units to move the unselected cards horizontally in a direction opposite to the direction of horizontal movement of said selected cards to compress the unselected cards against the frame of said lower frame unit.

3. A card storage and selection device comprising:

an upper frame unit and lower frame unit assembled together in telescoping relationship and adapted to be vertically separated;

a deck of cards supported in an upright position with- .in said units, said cards having coded edge perforations for classification;

a row of sorting needles horizontally disposed on said upper unit and adapted to be moved horizontally through said assembled units and into engagement with the edge perforations of the cards in said card deck;

means for coding said sorting needles in symmetrical fashion into two adjacent equal groups to provide pairs of similarly coded needles, each said pair of needles relating to a single card to be selected;

selector means for moving selected pairs of similarly coded needles into engagement with the edge perforations of selected cards in said card deck, said sorting needles being effective to lift and separate the selected cards from said card deck upon vertical separation of said units and said selector means comprising a selector bar mounted on said upper unit, said selector bar being equal in length to and in alignment with one of said sorting needle groups and adapted for horizontal movement in the same direction as said sorting needles;

a tab member s'lideable along said selector bar for positioning in alignment with a selected coded sorting needle whereby movement of the selector bar toward said assembled unit Will result in said tab member pushing said selected needle into engagement with the coded edge perforation of a selected card in said card deck; and

means for enabling said selector bar to be rotated into alignment with the other of said sorting needle groups whereby said tab member will be automatically positioned in alignment with the sorting needle corresponding in code to said one first selected so that said second sorting needle may be moved into engagement with a coded edge perforation of said selected card.

References (Cited by the Examiner UNITED STATES PATENTS 999,991 8/1911 Hargrave 129-161 2,002,807 5/1935 Whitson 129--16.1 2,492,910 12/1949 Welk 129-tl6.1 2,524,918 10/1950 McKeown 129-16.1 2,587,682 3/1952 Bard 129-4161 2,610,632 9/1952 Rembold 129-16.1 2,683,458 7/1954 Davis et al 12916.1

FOREIGN PATENTS 935,616 2/11948 France.

609,876 10/ 1948 Great Britain.

JEROME SCHNALL, Primary Examiner. 

1. A CARD STORAGE AND SELECTION DEVICE COMPRISING: A PAIR OF FRAME UNITS ASSEMBLED TOGETHER IN VERTICAL TELESCOPING FASHION AND ADAPTED TO BE VERTICALLY SEPARATED; A DECK OF CARDS SUPPORTED IN AN UPRIGHT POSITION WITHIN SAID UNITS, SAID CARDS HAVING CODED EDGE PERFORATIONS AND CLASSIFICATION; A ROW OF SORTING NEEDLES HORIZONTALLY DISPOSED ON ONE OF SAID UNITS AND ADAPTED TO BE MOVED HORIZONTALLY THROUGH SAID ASSEMBLED UNITS AND INTO ENGAGEMENT WITH THE EDGE PERFORATIONS OF THE CARDS IN SAID CARD DECK; SELECTOR MEANS FOR MOVING SELECTED ONES OF SAID SORTING NEEDLES INTO ENGAGEMENT WITH THE EDGE PERFORATIONS OF SELECTED CARDS IN SAID CARD DECK, SAID SORTING NEEDES BEING EFFECTIVE TO LIFT AND SEPARATE THE SELECTED CARD FROM SAID CARD DECK UPON VERTICAL SEPARATION OF SAID UNITS; COMPRESSING MEANS IN SAID ONE UNIT HAVING THE SORTING NEEDLES AND MEANS ON SAID OTHER UNIT FOR HOLDING SAID COMPRESSING MEANS DISENGAGED FROM SAID CARD DECK WHEN SAID UNITS ARE ASSEMBLED, SAID COMPRESSING MEANS BEING EFFECTIVE UPON VERTICAL SEPARATION OF THE UNITS TO MOVE THE SELECTED CARDS HORIZONTALLY IN ONE DIRECTION TO COMPRESS SAME AGAINST THE FRAME OF THAT UNIT; AND COMPRESSING MEANS IN SAID OTHER UNIT AND MEANS ON SAID ONE UNIT FOR HOLDING SAID LAST NAMED COMPRESSING MEANS DISENGAGED FROM SAID CARD DECK WHEN SAID UNITS ARE ASSEMBLED, SAID LAST NAMED COMPRESSING MEANS BEING EFFECTIVE UPON VERTICAL SEPARATION OF THE UNITS TO MOVE THE UNSELECTED CARDS HORIZONTALLY IN A DIRECTION OPPOSITE TO THE DIRECTION OF HORIZONTAL MOVEMENT OF SAID SELECTED CARDS TO COMPRESS THE UNSELECTED CARDS AGAINST THE FRAME OF SAID OTHER UNIT. 